woahfraze

Great job. This stuff is illuminating, but it also can be hard to draw full conclusions on certain plays because we aren't in the rooms with the players and coaches, so we don't know what the protection schemes should be or what the progressions are for reading the routes. On this one, I can't tell if this is on the offensive line or on Bryce. It could be that the protection wasn't properly called pre-snap and/or that combined with deceptive blitz design by the Vikings. Basically, the offensive line doesn't kick out to block the free rusher, but that's because it looks like there are multiple guys running at the RT and RG only for one of them to drop in coverage after a step and a half toward them on a feigned blitz. The offensive line has to block inside out, as the inside defenders have a shorter route to the QB. This left the LG with noone to block, with Moton handling the end, allowing the defender furthest out with a free run at Bryce. Without knowing how they handle protections, I don't know if this is an issue with how the protection was called once the Vikings showed blitz, an issue with the offensive linemen communicating pass offs o blocks during the play, or something else. It's tough to diagnose who is and isn't going to come on a Brian Flores defense, so my assumption is that the offense has to assume they all are and call the protection accordingly. With the look the VIkings showed pre-snap, that would mean Bryce should have known that there would be a guy unblocked and that defender was his responsibility, meaning he has to hit his guy on a hot route quickly after the snap. He has Hurst open on the curl route to his left and should have gotten the ball to him in that scenario. But it looks like Bryce didn't conside that blitzer as his responsibility. Not sure if that's on him or someone else, as I don't know if Bryce or Bozeman calls the protections.

Noone is saying he needs to be surrounded by world beaters at all positions. But the fact of the matter is that the offensive infrastructure--that is both the personnel, the scheme, and the playcalling--have not set him up to succeed. If any one of the following was happening, Bryce would look better: The offensive line was executing (and yes, part of the struggles are due to injuries, which are largely out of anyone's control); The scheme did not put ask the offensive line to block in a scheme (zone) that is not suited to their strengths (power scheme); The playcalling/scheme/coaching directives were not so predictable--e.g. such a large percentage of runs on first down, draining the play clock to 1 before snapping, not utilizing the whole play book and limiting the number of routes downfield All of the above have allowed defenses to really crowd the line of scrimmage and both overwhelm the offensive line and jam a group of receiving targets that aren't the best at creating separation in the first place. The scheme does not call or much motion or route combinations that would assist the receivers from creating separation on a more consistent basis. It's all a bunch of feedback loops. There are deficiencies in a lot of areas, and each deficiency magnifies problems in other areas. It all adds up to a dysfunctional offense. And a lot of these compounding issues can be corrected not by having all stars at every position, but simply getting competent, NFL-level performances from the players on the roster. Bryce is not blameless. He has missed some WRs. He has failed to recognized disguised coverages and blitzes. He has not held onto the ball when trying to extend plays. But the anti-Bryce crowd here has been blind to a fair number of positives. He has shown some ability to extend plays. He has shown the ability to scramble for first downs. He has shown pretty good accuracy in stretches where the offense plays with more tempo and they give him the opportunity to work the short-middle of the field. And most encouragingly of all, he has shown some really good anticipation on a few throws, releasing the ball before the receiver gets out of their break. Yes, the arm strength is never going to be top notch. But I don't agree with the takes that he has zero zip on his throws. The anti-Bryce crowd seem to falsely be painting the view of Bryce supporters as folks that think he's absolutely a franchise QB. But almost no one is saying that. Most of us are acknowledging that he's in a bad situation. That context is important. I was a Stroud guy going into the draft. I'm glad to see him doing well with the Texans. I wish we had taken him. But I don't think he'd be performing nearly as well in our current situation, not that that matters since Bryce is our QB.

There does need to be accountability, but the success of an offensive line is so dependent on all 5 guys being on the same page and being able to communicate with one another. Continuity is important, and this sort of shuffling in-game is likely not going to help.

I thought he was legitimately good in Week 1–had numerous impressive reps where he completely stonewalled his DT assignment in one on ones. But since then he’s had a lot of plays where the defender has put him on skates.

I don’t really agree with the overall thread name. We certainly are not OK. We are a terrible team. But I do agree that Bryce isn’t fully to blame. Has he made mistakes? Yes. He has missed open WRs on occasion. He has struggled to diagnose disguised coverages presnap. He has not protected the ball. But the infrastructure around him is really terrible. The offensive line cannot consistently block, both in the run and odd games. A lot of times when the WRs win, Bryce doesn’t have time to get the ball to them. A lot of times where the line gives him time, the WRs don’t get open. The staff has to recognize that the line isn’t winning in the run game and not put us in 2nd and 3rd and longs by calling run plays when they have. Bryce looked pretty good when they let him thrown intermediate lot in the middle of the field and he could get in a rhythm. But then the playcalling torpedoed things. Basically, no one is in sync and so the overall product is just garbage. We need the coaches to put the players in a position to succeed and the players, Bryce included, need to execute at the same time. Given all that, I think it’s too early to write of Bryce. But I am worried that this start will break him.

Hate to be a pessimist, but the Panthers as currently constituted are one of the few teams that I feel are likely to lose a game where they get a defensive score. Hopefully they can seize the momentum.

The only Jeudy I’m pro-trading for is Doug Judy, the Pontiac Bandit himself. Seriously, what has Jerry Jeudy actually shown over his 3 year career to warrant a 3rd rounder? He’s not a JAG, but he’s closer to one than he is to major difference maker. Could our roster benefit from someone like that? Sure. But not at the expense of a 3rd rounder when we’re already short on draft picks due to the Bryce Young trade.

It was due to a busted coverage, but Chark may have been more open on that play than all our WRs have been combined so far this season lol

At this point, they should just throw it to the studio. It's unwatchable.

Really well done and thorough analysis. He showed the good and the bad. JT O’Sullivan didn’t show as many of the “negative” plays for Bryce. This guy does a better job of showing the whole picture. And the overall takeaway is still the same as JT’s: that Bryce has done a lot of good things and has been hampered by his situation. Yes, there’s still been some rookie bad too, but he hasn’t played all that poorly and a lot of the lack of production has come down to the circumstances of offensive architecture and the execution of his teammates. I was already less doom and gloom than a lot of others here on the Huddle, but this video has me more optimistic for the future (even if I’m still overall pessimistic for this season).

That was a safe throw though. He just had to air it out and put enough on it that only Olave and not the defender could make a play on the ball. And he almost missed it. Had Olave not made a crazy catch, that goes down in the book as an overthrow. That’s not exactly the same thing as throwing someone open with anticipation into a tight window. Im not saying you would do this, but I guarantee if Bryce had made that attempt on a similar play and overthrew the WR by just a smidge and the WR doesn’t come down with it because we don’t have good WRs, this Board would be going ballistic that he hadn’t thrown an accurate ball.

Obviously it’s hyperbole on both ends. Of course there are plays where there are WRs open. But the fact of the matter is, our WRs are struggling to consistently create separation. And for the keyboard warriors like us who don’t play the game, we don’t know how much of that is to blame on their limitations, then not executing, and the play design/calling not scheming them open. It’s probably all of the above. And on plays where you could find a WR open, on some of them, Bryce is at fault for not finding them. And on others, it’s on the offensive line for not giving Bryce the time to find them. And on others, Bryce finds the open WR but they drop the ball (e.g. Mingo on that slant last night). Its a collective team failure and I think it’s unfair to place all the blame on Bryce. Which is not the same as saying he’s blameless at all.

The folks who are saying they’ve seen no flashes whatsoever from Bryce so far either are just box score scouting, don’t know anything about football, or simply people who will forever find something to complain about. Three throws from last night stick in my mind. The first was in the 3rd quarter, I believe. We were backed up near our own end zone and early in the drive, Bryce made a really nice throw for a first down while rolling to his left. The throw was a bit back across his body and had some zip on it. This sort of off platform, odd arm angle throw is absolutely an NFL throw and not every QB could make it. It demonstrates that Bryce has good enough arm strength. Arm strength isn’t just about throwing the ball long. It’s about the zip on the ball. Bryce isn’t Cam or Josh Allen. He can’t throw a frozen rope 40 yards to the far hash, but not a lot of QBS can. He’s got enough arm strength to play at this level. The last two were on the final TD drive. That throw to Mingo right before the TD was some capital A anticipation. He made a nice shoulder fake and then released the ball before Mingo made his break to the post. The other throw was a really nice find for the two point conversion. It didn’t look like he had anything available as he rolled right, but he fit the ball in for the conversion. He showed some flashes, particularly of his anticipation, in the Atlanta game too. Yes, we’d all like him to have performed more consistently at this point, but it’s clear as day watching that his inconsistency is just part of our overall problem on offense. It feeds and is fed by some really poor scheming, route design, and playcalling as well as failure to execute by teammates. It’s hard to know what’s the chicken and what’s the egg. Is the coaching staff unable to open up the playbook because they can’t trust the players or are the players looking worse because the coaching staff aren’t dialing up the right plays at the right time? Nothing has clicked. The team, coaching staff included, hasn’t gelled. Whether they will or not remains to be seen. Im less hopeful that the coaching staff will figure things out than I am Bryce will improve his consistency. And unfortunately that might mean overall Bryce will be seen as struggling more than he actually is.

That shouldn’t have been overturned

In no way a sustainable recipe for sustained success, but holy poo that drive was entirely rushing yards—and yes, the swing pass to Shenault is still a running play. Lol. Props to the offensive line. But more proof we definitely need to move on from Darnold (and all our other QBs) next year.

It’d be really nice if late in the game, they’d pump fake that throw and then hit RB or TE sneaking out the back side. But hell, this team couldn’t even run simple play action late in the game instead of running into brick walls when trying to salt the game away, so probably too much to ask to add some deception into their passing game. On the subject of the coaching staff limiting PJ, I think some of it last night had to do with the rain. It was just harder to throw downfield in that sort of weather with a slick ball. That being said, they do seem to be doing that quite a bit globally, and it’s really hindering us IMO. Yesterday PJ did show the bad—a really bad dropped INT—so I see where the coaches are coming from. But when you put the restrictor plate on, the offense isn’t effective. He can make plays down the field in a normal passing offense. You have to take the good with the bad and hope PJ limits those mistakes to an acceptable level. That also being said, I’m firmly in the camp that PJ ain’t the guy. Good backup? Sure. But we need to draft our franchise guy.

Truth is, we already know none of our QBs are the guy. We simply don’t have a franchise QB. Could any three of them play competently, and perhaps even well, for short stretches? Yes. But those instances are most often when the surrounding situation allows it—i.e. great supporting play from those around them, favorable game script situations, etc. They aren’t good enough to rise above their limitations on a consistent basis or elevate the play of the entire offense. So it doesn’t really matter who we trot out there. Sure, get more film on each of them to see who might be retained as a serviceable backup, even though I don’t need more game tape to know the answer is Mayfield, which is not an endorsement of him but rather an acknowledgment of how bad Walker and Darnold are…just keep him below 70%. But whoever we play, there’s only a low level of competitive we are going to be able to achieve.

Dumb dumb dumb. He's a the type of piece that would have helped attract and then aid int he success of a young offensive minded coach. Utilized properly, as a weapon in the passing game isolated against linebackers and safeties with less emphasis on running, he's well worth his contract. Also, this is going to kill our cap with all the dead money.

All depends on the overall mass and distribution of contaminants in the subsurface and also the characteristics of the subsurface (e.g. depth to groundwater, permeability/hydraulic conductivity of the aquifer, etc.). In many cases, contamination is simply too large in scale and/or there are geologic constraints for implementing remediation techniques to adequately clean up the impacts, at least not in a cost-effective way. In those case, it's better to conduct a risk assessment and determine if property occupants will be adversely affected by the contamination and to mitigate any identified health risks accordingly. That of course also can cost a good bit of money, but is often much cheaper than environmental cleanup. In some cases, you see a combination of the two approaches.

Environmental consultant specializing in Brownfields redevelopment here in the Charlotte area. Contaminated soil is not a barrier to building a stadium at the Pipe and Foundry (or other contaminated property). The environmental issues can be managed; it's simply a matter of cost, as contaminated soils would need to be disposed of to a properly permitted landfill at a higher price per ton than non-impacted soil leaving the site. Contaminated groundwater beneath the site could also require a vapor intrusion mitigation system be installed beneath the occupied portions of the stadium (not the concourses or seating areas that are open air). All these measures are things that can be and are regularly done during construction projects that encounter contaminated environmental media. It just requires more money to properly coordinate with the appropriate regulatory agencies and properly manage the contaminated media.

I’m firmly in the camp of not trading McCaffrey. Obviously the game plan yesterday was too heavily skewed toward passing him the ball on screens because our QB situation prevented us from running a normal passing attack. But you saw what McCaffrey was able to do with all those touches. This type of use (obviously as a lower percentage of offensive plays, with an offense that also throws intermediate and deep to keep the defense honest and guessing) is how McCaffrey should have been used all along. When you look at that sort of offensive role, where McCaffrey is more of a WR that can also line up in the backfield, the contract doesn’t look so bad. And having him as an incredible weapon, perhaps along with a decent, at least functional offensive line, is really the only attractive qualities our offense has for a potential new head coach. I don’t think an extra first or a couple 2nds is going to provide more value for us to having him on the roster. Even if I had more confidence that the front office could select players in the draft that will be studs or major contributors with the picks we’d garner for McCaffrey in a trade, the trade would still really hamper our ability to construct a talented roster because all of the dead money. So when you combine those two factors, I say we hold onto him and try to restock the cupboard by trying to trade other pieces, even if the return won’t be as good.

I don't think they could. This was a makeup game from one that had been rained out earlier in the season after they played 15 minutes. Kickoff last started with 15 minutes having already elapsed. I think they had to put out the same lineups and were unable to use subs if they had already done so in the previous 15 minute period, as we had when Carujo got injured. Dumb that they tried to even play that game, but it is what it is. Ref missed a penalty on Karol late. Would have been a bit light, but he called the game tight for the most part, so should have been a penalty. My thought is that CFC played well enough to win, but didn't deserve to win, if that makes any sense. Sucks to be eliminated from playoff contention, but noone expected to make the playoffs this first season. Glad to see they showed some flashes and improvement over the course of the season.

Not arguing about health--I don't know what Cleveland's situation was last year. But Mage's point is a valid one. Sack rates tend to follow QBs around. Just look at Joe Burrow this year thus far. He was sacked an incredible amount last year. And the Bengals went out and invested big time in upgrading the offensive line, similarly to how we made fixing our's a priority. But Burrow is still getting sacked at a high rate this year. It comes down to his style of play. He hangs onto the ball a long time and when he bails from the pocket, he's hellbent on extending the play for as long as possible to try to find an open man downfield rather than throwing the ball away. It all leads to high sack totals regardless of how good the offensive line is. Russell Wilson is another good example. I'm not going to sit here and say our offensive line is necessarily top 10. But it is vastly improved from last year, despite struggling with consistency. So Baker is to blame for a lot of the dysfunction in the pass game, particularly with sacks.

My takeaways from the offense All-22: Pass protection was better than I expected. Some inconsistency, particularly on Icky's part with getting beat outside, but he was a rookie go against Myles Garrett, so that's I won't be overly critical of his peformance. For all the talk that we gave him help, I don't really feel that is the case. Sure we had a TE or RB lined up on his side a lot when facing Garrett, but I feel like often times, those players didn't actually double team or even throw a chip. Struggles in the passing game were a combination of lack of chemistry between Baker and the WRs (miscommunication with the hot route on the interception), Baker missing his reads and/or scrambling from the pocket when he didn't need to, and the spillover effect of not being able to run the ball effectively against light boxes (see below). Run blocking was terrible. Some of this probably comes down to execution (e.g. interior linemen not getting close enough together on double teams and allowing the defensive linemen to split them and get into the backfield to blow up the play), but I think a lot of it comes down to scheme. The Browns were playing light in the box on a lot of our running plays and I saw a lot of instances where our scheme left guys from the edge completely unblocked and allowed them to slice behind our line and run down our back from the side before we could make any gains. I understand running away from unblocked players, but you've got to set up the runs in such a way that the unblocked player can't make a play. And if that's not working, then trust your guys up front to win their matchup and use your numbers advantage to block the edge guy instead of double teaming. As for the defense, I don't know for sure if it's more scheme or more personnel, but I feel like scheme has more to do with it than execution on the players' parts. I've linked two Brett Kollmann videos from last year. The first was created after Week 3 last year and broke down why we had been so tough to run against in the first three games. We were able to stop the run by using a lot of 3-4 over fronts where the nose tackle is tilted toward the center and a 4i technique weak side DE that used a concept called "gap stealing," and those choices often allowed us to play the run using relatively light boxes out of a nickel base defense. The second video was uploaded after Week 4 when we gave up 250 yards to Dallas. It explains that Dallas used heavy personnel to combat our base defense and we refused to exit our nickel defense. Also maddeningly, we didn't attack their runs with the same fronts that had been successful in the past three games but just one time. I didn't really pay close attention the remainder of the season, but my intuition is that other teams took notice of that and used the Dallas tape to scheme against how we play the run, but that a lot of it basically just comes down to our scheme not providing for proper gap integrity. And it's on our coaches to readjust.